Nature Museum Opens Exhibit of My Photos
Focused on neighboring North Pond, the show features 26 of my nature photos
All in All, They’re Just My Nature Pix on the Wall
I’ve been hinting around about some big personal news coming up. And now it’s here: Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum in Chicago’s Lincoln Park has launched an exhibit of my nature photography, titled Life on the Pond, which will be open for the next year on the museum’s 2nd floor.
Barb and I visited the exhibit on Monday (October 23) and I am just bursting with pride. Many thanks to Tara Preston, the museum’s multi-media graphic design manager; I just provided the photos and some input on the exhibit’s text, and Tara did the rest. Also thanks to Bethany Fleming, who planned the exhibit, and Alvaro Ramos, the museum’s vice president and chief curator, who appreciated my photography and authorized the exhibit.
I have been writing and editing professionally for more than 40 years, and photography has not been my calling card. But I’ve always had the bug, and since we moved to Chicago in 2011, I became deeply engrossed in capturing Chicago’s extraordinary natural environment.
Not long after Chicago became our forever home, I discovered North Pond, located in the park with its southern terminus near Fullerton Avenue. It is a bird sanctuary, and I’ve often described it as a Bob sanctuary. In good times and bad, I often retreated to the pond with my camera, immersing myself in nature in the middle of this busy metropolitan city, just a mile and a half from our apartment in Lakeview.
About eight years ago, I decided to try to sell some of my pictures and participated in a few arts and crafts shows. If you could monetize compliments, I would have made a nice profit, but folks weren’t buying the nature photography I was selling.
In 2018, it dawned on me that my big portfolio of photos taken at North Pond might be of interest to Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum, located adjacent to the pond’s southeast corner. I sent a note to their contact e-mail asking if they’d be interested in carrying some of my work in their gift shop. Instead, they invited me in to discuss an exhibit.
I’m not trying to be dramatic when I say that this exhibit has been five years in the making.
Shortly after that 2018 meeting I was officially invited to exhibit my photography for six months starting in late 2019. In the interim, though, the museum decided to extend exhibits to a full year instead of six months. I agreed to a delay because I liked the idea of a year-long exhibit — but it turned out that the delay put me smack in the middle of the COVID shutdowns. My exhibit was first rescheduled to begin in October 2022, and then in October 2023 in order to accommodate the artists who were in line before me when the pandemic hit.
So maybe I’m savoring the moment even more than I would have had there not been all of the interruptions.
Seeing the exhibit in real life on the walls of a bonafide museum is almost surreal. It provides validation of the time and effort I’ve taken to pursue what I’ve called a hobby on steroids.
And taking pictures of an exhibit of my own pictures is pretty much as meta as I get.
I sincerely hope that some of you will pay a visit to the museum to take in the exhibit, will let me know what you think, and if you like it, will recommend it to your friends and family. And if you are planning a visit, I’d absolutely love it if you’d let me know; if my schedule allows, I’d be happy to meet you at the museum and then provide a personal tour of North Pond.
While you’re at the museum, you can check out the other exhibits, including the amazing Butterfly Haven (I’ll have some photos in Wednesday’s newsletter) and the new Sustainability Center.
In the meantime, we’re experiencing one of the best fall color seasons at North Pond, so here are some fresh photos from one of my favorite places.
Plus, a posing squirrel.
Congrats Bob! That's very exciting!